Hindustan Times
CODA Club hears the cry of acoustically challenged
Mamta Mishra
Indore, 3 April
FOURTEEN-YEAR-old
Silky Kaur and her 11-year-old sister Babita Kaur always feel neglected
both at home and society, as they are CODAs - acronym for Children of
Deaf Adults.
Ten-year-old
Chahat More, who belongs to this category, feels lonely and confused at
home and even in his friend circle, as he never finds anyone with whom
he can share his problems and be himself. But soon such children will
get answers for all their queries and solutions to problems. They can
have a place where they can get together and participate in a host of
activities to enjoy and keep themselves busy.
The place is
CODA Club, a concept introduced for the first time in India, probably in
Asia, by Anand Service Society, Indore, an institute for acoustically
challenged people. The club would be inaugurated on April 11 at the
Anand Service Society, Indore, located at Scheme no-54, Vijay Nagar.
Says Society
director Gyanendra Purohit that CODA Club for children or kids of deaf
adults is brainchild of his wife Monika Purohit who also happens to be
in charge of CODA Club. Purohit says that children of deaf parents are
born into unique circumstances, especially given that majority of them
are born with the ability to hear. This is where they are confused
because their deaf parents are their only role models and they end up
totally unsure about their own abilities.
They live in two
worlds - the deaf world and the hearing - and often are trapped in it.
Many struggle with their identity - with whether they are hearing, hard
of hearing or deaf. They are like children raised with two or more
cultures and languages. Just as children from other cultures have
experiences that vary, no two codas share the exact same experience.
“They have a
wide range of problems in their day-to-day life and complexities in
dealing with their parents and society and it is same with their parents
who do not know how to bring up their children. Problem of education,
career, dealing with people, several behavioural problems and the list
is endless for such children. In such condition ‘codas’ feel
neglected, have guilt or inferiority complex and grow with several
behavioural problems. To deal with all such problems we decided to have
an organised special club for these children which would act like
‘child guidance clinic cum entertainment club,” says Purohit.
Says Monika
Purohit, “The concept of CODA came in 1983 for the first time when
CODA International was formed in the US. Though we have always been in
touch with such children through their parents and have been organising
a host of activities from time to time, it was never in an organised
form. These children always kept complaining to us about being lonely,
neglected, and sometimes also about their problems”, she adds.
“Recently, we
decided to launch this concept of CODA club exclusively for ‘codas’.
The Club that would start with at least 25 members on April 11 would
offer free services to all the codas”, she says.
Among the
various activities through CODA Club they would focus mainly on
counselling of codas for their education, moral education (which they
usually lack due to disabled parents) and behavioural problems. The club
would also organise get-together programmes for these children wherein
they can come out with their hidden talents.
Says Monika,
“At present, we have clubs for acoustically challenged adults only and
these children willingly or unwillingly are forced to accompany their
parents. However, they cannot enjoy or participate actively in any of
the activities held in these clubs due to the language problem”.
The club would
also run training courses for children interested in music, dance,
painting yoga and physical and other sports activities. In addition to
this it would also run courses in sign language development so that
these children can understand their parents better. A ‘Deaf Film
Festival’ would also be organised for these children wherein all such
movies based on acoustically challenged would be screened for these
children and their parents.
The club would also have CODA Fund Bank, which would have nothing to do with money. Codas can deposit and share their valuables like comics, storybooks, toys and other items through this bank. The club in its later stage would also come up with crèche for kids of acoustically challenged working parents.
We are helping you to express your feelings towards the world in efficient and skillful manner. For this purpose we are doing some researches for improvement of sign language. Through which you got liberty to communicate with world.
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